Ohio State receiver Jalin Marshall fumbled at the Gophers 1, and fumbled a punt later at his 10, and made Saturday's 31-24 victory for the Buckeyes closer on the scoreboard than in reality.
There was both pride in the Gophers' effort and sadness over a "tough loss'' in my Twitter feed and e-mail account after the game.
I can sign off on the pride part, but to me a tough loss is when you play evenly with the other club and have a strong chance at victory. The Gophers gave up 489 yards and were dominated by J.T. Barrett, Ohio State's terrific quarterback.
Now that I've reached the age of a sage, there's an urge to provide enlightenment when being the recipient of misguided observations – such as fans using "tough loss'' as an synonym for "heartbreaking'' when it wasn't.
After pointing that out, the responses from the fans were of this vein:
"True, but this one was way different than the whipping Minnesota endured the last time OSU came to town. Different program now.''
The Buckeyes' last football visit to Minneapolis was in 2010, when Tim Brewster had been fired and interim coach Jeff Horton was left to rally the troops. The final was 52-10 for Ohio State.
So, the way I read it, from this gentleman and a half-dozen other communicators on Saturday, we have the need to justify a deserved loss by pointing out how much better shape the program is in than when Kill became the coach in 2010.
